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 “Additional Responsibilities” in Consulting

During both consulting recruiting and the initial months working in consulting, experienced by myself and my friends, the top priority for a consulting career which has been consistently emphasized has been delivering excellent client work. Arguably, the second priority has been persistent learning. Both of these are pretty self-evident to understand and appreciate. However, there is a third consulting career priority that I did not fully understand or appreciate until I started consulting. Broadly speaking, I will refer to them as “additional responsibilities”, although different firms label them as different things, such as “plus ones” or “initiatives”. I want to demystify what exactly additional responsibilities are, their value in a consulting career, and provide some recommendations on how best to think about them.

What are Additional Responsibilities?

Additional responsibilities are activities that consultants take on to support the internal operations of the firm. Just to better illustrate it, prime examples include:

  • Social activity planning
  • Recruiting support
  • Firm wide volunteering / community support
  • Thought leadership
  • Internal training / professional development

Such activities really do drive the vibrancy of a consulting firm. Utilizing social planning as the prime example, they are more than just entertainment opportunities, but networking and collaboration events. They are opportunities for people from various different teams that would rarely see each other otherwise to get an opportunity to mingle.

How a Consultant Can Think About Additional Responsibilities

1. Fulfilling a Job Expectation

Most firms have an expectation of at least a minimum benchmark level of additional responsibility work. Hypothetically, a consultant can get away without any additional responsibility involvement. However, the general sentiment I have come to understand about such an approach is that it is highly frowned upon. As long as there is consistent and well executed involvement in something, most firms will view it as completing the requirement.

2. Networking

Most additional responsibilities contain an inherent networking opportunity. For example, recruiting trips offer the opportunity to engage other consultants and even firm leadership present for the event. Additional responsibilities should thereby really be appreciated as a networking supercharger.

3. Having Fun

Generally speaking, there is some level of choice in what additional responsibilities are taken on. I always recommend that at least one of the additional responsibilities should be something that the consultant has fun with, be it out of passion or sheer entertainment. Personally, I selected involvement in social events as I enjoy event planning and bringing cheer to my colleagues. I know some of my colleagues get a real enjoyment from going back to their schools to do recruiting events and talking to students about our firm and consulting. This really gets them re-energized.

Acquiring Additional Responsibilities

There are essentially three ways to acquire additional responsibilities. I list them below with some corresponding examples:

  1. Compete for a pre-established position – You can do this by sending in a competitive application for a cohort leadership responsibility
  2. Volunteer for an internally advertised open position – This involves volunteering to partake in recruiting efforts for a specific function or set of schools
  3. Establish an additional responsibility via individual initiative – The range of initiatives you might create depends on the limits of your creativity.For example, you might choose to create an internal instructional video for coding based upon your individual prior experience.  Alternatively, you might decide to establish a firm aligned monthly volunteer program for local schools.

At this point, you might be getting excited about the many opportunities to get involved in your consulting firm. Alternatively, you might be concerned about the distractions that additional responsibilities might add to your already busy life. It is important to remember that additional responsibilities should not be viewed as burdens, but as opportunities that you can take advantage of for both professional and personal gain.

Hall Wang is a dual degree MBA and Master of Public Policy graduate from Georgetown University who has recently matriculated into a major management consulting firm. He has worked at America’s most innovative companies including Blue Origin and Facebook, as well as having done two combat deployments as a US Army Officer.

Image: Pexels

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